Jos Kirps's Popular Science and Technology Blog
The Computer Mouse - patented 37 years ago on November 17, 1970, by Douglas C. Engelbart
November 17, 2007Many people think the computer mouse was invented during the 1980's as it then became popular with the Apple Macintosh, the Amiga and Atari home computers, and later the PC. But it had been invented much earlier by Dr. Douglas C. Engelbart during the 1960's.
He started working on pointing devices in 1963, his computer mouse was first shown to the public in 1968, although there was no GUI yet and thus most people didn't find it that interesting as a concept. On November 17, 1970, Engelbart was granted Patent US3541541 for his pointing device.
During the 1970's Xerox continued the development of the mouse and related GUI concepts at the Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). The first commercially available mouse came with the Xerox Star computer system in 1981, but it flopped. Apple licensed the mouse concept and introduced the GUI based Lisa and Macintosh computers in 1983 respectively 1984, which finally marked the beginning of the computer mouse's success story.
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Cray-1: A Supercomputer Way Ahead Of Its Time
November 20, 2007
High performance microprocessors didn't exist yet, therefore the new machine used a large number of high speed integrated circuits (ICs) with a total of about 200,000 gates, a complexity comparable to the Intel 80386 which became available 10 years later. The main register set consisted of eight 64-bit scalar registers and eight 24-bit address registers, plus 64 shadow registers and eight 64 bit vector registers. The system contained four buffers that could pipeline 64 instructions and feed the 12 functional units.
The indicated performance was 160 MIPS, when execution real world applications the system generally offered a performance of about 136 megaflops, with peaks of up to 250 megaflops when running highly optimized software. Since 1978 the Cray-1 was running the Cray Operating System (COS), later machines were running UNICOS, Cray's UNIX derivate.A major design problem was the signal speed between the different modules and boards, therefore the system included a lot of hardware to delay signals, cables were cut to very specific lengths in order to avoid electrical reflections and the entire chassis was bent into a large C-shape so that wire-lengths were shorter. The system weighed 5.5 tons including the freon refrigeration system, the complete system consumed an incredible 250 kW of power when running.
Today a common Mac or PC is about 100 times faster than a Cray-1.
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In Memory Of The Commodore C128
November 27, 2007The Commodore 128 or simply "C128" was Commodore Business Machines's successor of the bestselling C64. The C128 was a very interesing machine, but it wasn't a very successful one. My first computer was a C128D, and today I'd like to tell you a bit more about it.
First of all, the C128 included three "operating modes": the all new C128 mode offering a greatly improved BASIC language, an 80 character display and full access to the 128 KB of RAM (expandable to 640 KB), an almost fully compatible C64 mode and a CP/M 3.0 OS that could be booted from a floppy disk. The advantage of this design was a tremendous amount of available software due to the C64 and CP/M compatibility. The problem, however, was that many people mostly used the C64 mode, and software developers thus didn't write much software for the new C128 native mode. CP/M was quite slow on the C128 and it was already declining as MS-DOS became more and more popular.
To run all three modes the C128 included two CPUs, a 2 Mhz MOS 8502 (which was twice as fast as the 1 Mhz 6510 used in the C64) and a 4 Mhz Zilog Z80 for the CP/M mode. The C128D even had three processors, as the built-in disk drive had it's own 6502 CPU. Quite outstanding for a home computer in the mid 1980's, but there were major CPU design flaws too. The 8502 usually only ran at half speed, as the C64 compatible VIC video controller for TV sets only supported 1 Mhz. Running at full speed was only possible when using the VDC video controller, which could not be connected to TV sets though. As most people used their home computers with common TV sets in the 1980's they could only work with the C128 at half speed. There were similar problems with the Zilog CPU, whose 4 Mhz clock speed was not supported by the rest of the hardware, making CP/M slower on the C128 than on other CP/M computers.
A really cool feature of the C128 were the two built-in video controllers (VIC and VDC), which means that you could connect two separate screens to it (either a TV set and a computer monitor or simply two monitors). It was possible to type commands on one screen while results were drawn on the other for example. Of course this feature was flawed too... First of all, the VIC and the VDC were not compatible, and even the built-in BASIC graphics commands didn't work on the VDC. As a developer you always had to write separate routines for both controllers. And, as mentioned above, using both screens at full CPU speed was not possible as the VIC didn't support this.Because of its hardware design the C128 was a cool machine for hackers, but not for end users. I wrote a hierachical file system and a VIC/VDC converter for the C128 for example, and even today I still think it was a great platform that could be used to learn a lot of thing about both hardware and software. It was a cool machine for running the GEOS graphical OS, although it couldn't compete with the newer Atari ST and Amiga computers which became available in the late 1980's.
But there were also some cool "hacks" that were quite outstanding:
- A company from Switzerland developed a software called "Graphic Booster" that used interlacing tricks to enable higher VDC resolutions of up to 752 x 700 pixels and thousands of possible colors. Such graphics specs were usually only available on high end graphics workstations back then, and the C128 running this software offered better graphics than Macs, Amiags or STs back then (but as there was almost no software supporting the Graphic Booster the impact remained quite low).
- In July 1986, COMPUTE!'s Gazette published a type-in program that boosted the global CPU performance by up to 20% when using the VIC video controller. This was possible by switching to fast mode (2 Mhz) during the "vertical blank period" (when the signal reached the bottom of the visible screen fast mode was enabled, the software switched back to slow mode when screen rendering began again at the top).
- Some people tried to make better use of the multiple CPUs. There were algorithms that were faster on the MOS 8502 while others showed better performance on the Zilog Z80 (due to the different architecture of the two CPUs), and there were a few programs that switched between the two CPUs for different tasks to perform better (in fact even CP/M 3.0 used the MOS 8502 in some BIOS routines). I also remember that there was at least one attempt to do multiprocessing with a C128D by using the MOS 8502 and the disk controller which was in fact a MOS 6502 and had its own RAM.
About 4 million C128 were sold between 1985 and 1989, compared to a total of around 30 million C64 (which was the best-selling single personal computer model of all time). Maybe the C128's failure was due to the design flaws mentioned above, to the lack of native software, to Commodore's crappy marketing or to the fact that most Commodore users were simply gamers and not hackers in most cases.
PS: There are now some really good C128 emulators around, so may google them and check them out!
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Intellivision: A Game Console Far Ahead Of Its Time
December 07, 2007
The CPU used in the Intellivision was a General Instruments CP1610, a general purpose microprocessor capable of supporting 16-bit addresses and 10-bit instructions. The US release used a CPU clock of 894,886.25 Hz while the european release used a 1 Mhz clock, due to the different NTSC / PAL specs, which means that games were running up to 10% faster on european consoles than on their US counterparts!
The CP1610 featured eight 16-bit registers - using a 16 bit CPU in a video game console was quite exceptional indeed. It had 1.2 kb of RAM (including 512 byte video memory) and 7 kb ROM (which included the "Executive ROM" - some kind of a mini-OS - and the "Graphics ROM" which included often used sprites for example). It's graphics performance was outstanding for the late 1970's, allowing a 160 x 196 pixel display using a 16 color palette (all colors could be used simultaneously), plus eight hardware supported sprites offering collision detection, mirroring and streching.
The game controllers were quite different too, as they featured a "disc" (somewhat similar to the Apple iPod clickwheel) instead of a joystick as well as a twelve-button numeric keypad. The disc was capable of 16 direction detection and games usually shipped with "overlay cards" that could be inserted into the controllers (in front of the numeric keypad - switching games required inserting a new cartridge AND flipping the overlay cards).
In 1980 the Intellivision became available in the entire US for US$299, the console was the first to pose a serious threat to Atari's dominance (Atari was the number one video game console producer back then). Mattel sold 175,000 consoles in 1980, with 19 availalble games. After Mattel realized that the game market offered good revenues, they launched their own software development group which became known as the "Blue Sky Rangers".
In 1981, Mattel launched a service that allowed to download games via cable TV. In 1982, Mattel sold 2 million consoles, more and more companies started developing software titles for the Intellivision.
The "Keyboard Component" should transform the console into a home computer, it was planned to include a MOS 6502 CPU (the one used by the C64 later on), 64K RAM and a built-in cassette tape drive. But during the process of developement many reliability problems occurred and the hardware was far too expensive. After repeated delays the Keyboard Component project was officially cancelled in 1982. Apparently about 4000 Keyboard Components had been shipped to selected customers for testing purposes, they are extremely rare today.As Mattel managers had been aware of the Keyboard Component problems for a long time, they had launched a secondary project in mid 1981 that could replace the component in case of a complete failure. It was released as Entertainment Computer System (ECS), it featured a keyboard with a cassette recorder interface and included 2k of additional RAM. It lacked the originally planned 6502 CPU and the 64K RAM extension, but it was functionalm cost effective and was finally able to turn the Intellivison into a home computer.
Intellivision was also the first game console to provide real-time human and robot voices during game play. The IntelliVoice module, which was required for using this feature, used an SP0256 Orator "voice chip" developed jointly by Mattel and General Instrument. But the IntelliVoice didn't sell as well as expected, and only a few games supporting it were ever released.
In 1983 Mattel also introduced the Intellivision II (which only introduced a revamped case) and the System Changer module (which allowed to play Atari 2600).
In 1983 and 1984 the video game market crashed. The new home computer systems became more and more popular and interest in classic game consoles vanished. Furthermore there was now a large number of video game consoles available, further subdividing the market. In 1983 Mattel Electronics posted a $300 million loss, in early 1984 the division was closed.
A liquidator purchased all rights, hardware and software sales continued until most of the inventory had been sold. Later on, Mattel Marketing executive Terry Valeski created INTV Corp. which sold the remaining stock via retail and mail order. They then introduced the INTV III, which was nothing but an Intellivison inside a new case, and continued developing a few games. The console was discontinued in 1991. More than 6 million Intellivision consoles were sold during 12 years, and a total of 125 games were available.
Keith Robinson, a former Mattel programmer, finally purchased the software rights, founded Intellivision Productions and released Intellivison emulators including the classic Intellivision games available for MacOS, Windows and modern-day consoles.
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Inside KITT, the Knight Industries Two Thousand
December 14, 2007KITT is a fictional artificial intelligence built into a black Pontiac Trans Am in the popular Knight Rider TV series, which ran between September 26, 1982, and August 8, 1986 starring David Hasselhoff as Michael Knight.
The KITT AI was originally created by Wilton Knight, a brilliant but eccentric billionaire, and then used by the U.S. government. The artificial intelligence relied an a Knight 2000 microprocessor which was the center of a "self-aware" cybernetic logic module that allowed KITT to think, learn, communicate and interact with humans. It was first installed in a mainframe computer in Washington D.C.. Later on, Wilton Knight modified the computer system and implemented it into a Pontiac car to be used by his own association, the Foundation for Law and Government.The car featured an Anamorphic Equalizer which allowed KITT to see, visible as a red scan-bar on the front of the car. The fiber-optic array of electronic eyes could see in all visual wavelengths as well as X-Ray and infrared. An Etymotic Equalizer allowed him to hear and his voice synthesizer allowed him to speak in english, french and spanish, and also to simulate other sounds. Furthermore he could smell using an atmospheric sampling device.
KITT was also able to drive the car by himself, even better than any human could. It also offered a lot of gimmicks such the Turbo Boost (which allows to jump over obstaclesby quickly accelerating to speeds in excess of 200 mph), a "Tri-Helical Plasteel 1000 Molecular Bonded Shell" armored plating which resists weapon fire as well as the "Super Pursuit Mode" which was added at a later stage.
Most features could be activated automatically by KITT or manually be the driver, using a multitude of buttons and panels in the cockpit - and it had LOTS of features, so here's just a basic list: police lights and a siren, a grappling hook and winch, a parachute, it could leak oil onto the road or produce smoke, it had a flame thrower, a tear gas launcher, ultramagnesium charges to divert heat-seeking missiles, traction spikes, a microwave jammer, tracking systems, an onboard laser powerpack, a bomb sniffer, a medical scanner, deflatable tires, self-tinting windows, a voice stress analyzer, a rotating license plate, a seat ejection system and much more (the entire list just too long).
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